Pastor Pastorum Part 6

then a new light might illumine these recollections, which had been laid by in his mind, and they would draw a fuller meaning from the new idea by which he was impelled; and he would see how G.o.d's purposes, long entertained, work to the surface by degrees.

There is one miracle in which I can see no other intent, than that of the instruction of the disciples and, as it may not come before us again, I will say a few words on it now. The withering of the fig tree was, as I have said in the Introduction, an acted parable: the most circ.u.mstantial account is that given by St Mark.

"And on the morrow, when they were come from Bethany, he was hungry: and seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came, if haply he might find any thing thereon: and when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves; for the time of figs was not yet. And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever. And his disciples heard it."(40)

Of the next day it is related:

"And in the morning, as they pa.s.sed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. And Peter calling to remembrance saith unto him, Master, behold, the fig tree which thou cursedst is withered away. And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have faith in G.o.d."(41)

When our Lord remarked from a distance one fig tree-probably one out of several, for Bethphage was named from its figs-which alone was in full leaf, He was drawn to it; whether this was because He saw occasion for impressing a lesson which He had at heart to give, or because He really expected to find refreshment, we cannot decide. The last motive is not excluded, for though the time of figs was not yet, still we are told that in Judaea the fruit of the fig is ripe by the time the leaves have reached their full size; and this display of foliage therefore gave prospect of fruit. We must not argue that our Lord would, of his superhuman illumination, have known that the tree was barren, for our Lord never uses this source of knowledge to find out what may be learned by ordinary means.

But whether our Lord approached the fig tree with the lesson in His mind or not, the aptness of the circ.u.mstance struck Him and the lesson it furnished was given on the spot. It was unusual for a tree to have leaves at that early season: by putting them forth, however, it held out hopes of fruit which it disappointed. This presented in a parable the situation of "the Jews' religion."(42) They made a show, and contrasted themselves with other nations, they dwelt on the fact that they alone wors.h.i.+pped the true G.o.d, and knew and observed His laws-they invited admiration on this ground-but of all this nothing came. So the fig tree seemed to say: "See I am green when other trees are leafless, you may look to me for fruit." It is said that this precocious putting forth of leaves shews that the tree is diseased and should be cut down, in like manner it was time that the Jewish Hierarchy should lose its office. It is to this Hierarchy that the words "No man eat fruit of thee henceforth and for ever" are really spoken. Mankind was no longer to draw its teaching from the scribes and priesthood of the Jews.

Individual Israelites might of course enlighten the world, as indeed they have done in a most remarkable degree; but the Jewish nation as a body was no longer to be the one recognised channel of G.o.d's communication with mankind. The leading people among them had wrapped themselves up in self-complacency and self-sufficiency; they had moreover enslaved themselves to the letter of their canonical books and to rabbinical traditions: they were therefore neither ready nor able to expand when expansion was needed. In other words, they were no longer fitted for a living world; which must, of its very nature, grow and change and discard all that will not change along with it; and so like the pretentious tree they were to wither away, and no man henceforth was to eat fruit of them for ever.

It would have been long before an Israelite could have brought himself to see this meaning in the words of our Lord; but St Peter must have thought over this last miracle, all the more from the apparent harshness of our Lord shewn in it-from its being the solitary instance of a final condemnation from His lips-and he must have asked himself; What did it mean?

There are many other miracles in which the instruction of the Apostles and notably of St Peter seems to be the leading aim. The walking on the water might have taught him how closely failure treads on the heels of impulse: the prophecy, "Before the c.o.c.k crow thou shalt deny me thrice," again conveyed this same lesson together with much beside: and the words "Then are the children free," which point the moral of the finding of the stater in the fish's mouth, must have recurred to St Peter when the Church at Jerusalem was debating as to how far she could free her Gentile members from the burdens of the Law. Of this I shall speak again. I have adduced sufficient instances to shew what I mean by miracles of instruction and the way in which they worked.

Lastly we come to the important subject of

(7) Miracles as a means of proof.

The signs, worked by our Lord, whatever other functions they fulfilled, had one office which in the eyes of some apologists is so important as to drive all other functions into the back-ground. They are regarded as the main ground of conviction. The Apostles, it is true, make little appeal to the Signs worked by Christ: this may have been because they worked similar Signs themselves, and knew that their enemies ascribed them to magic.

Their favourite arguments were the fulfilment of prophecy and the resurrection of the Lord. The earlier hearers were Jews, and the question with them was, "Did Jesus of Nazareth answer to the prophetic notices of the expected deliverer of their race?" The Jews we hear "were mightily convinced" by Apollos, not because he declared Christ's works but because he "shewed by the Scriptures that Jesus was the Christ."(43)

But in time the early preachers addressed themselves to the Gentiles. The Jewish notion of the Messiah was strange to hearers, who had never heard of the prophets; while the idea that G.o.d should love the world and reveal Himself to it commended itself to them, and they would expect that such a revelation would be accompanied by manifestations beyond human experience.

The consequence was that, after a century or two, less was made of prophecy and more was made of miracles: and if the question "What makes you believe that Jesus of Nazareth was the Son of G.o.d?" had then been put to all Christendom, the answer of an overwhelming majority would have been, "Because of the wondrous works which He performed."

We shall see, however, that our Lord does not Himself put Signs in the very forefront of His claims to the allegiance of men. He only appeals to them as subsidiary proofs; on which He would rest His cause when, owing to the situation or the disposition of the hearer, no higher kind of proof was available.(44)

It will be asked, "If miracles were only a subsidiary ground on which our Lord claimed belief; What was the primary one?" We shall see that our Lord's first appeal was Personal; He claimed men's allegiance from what they had seen of Him and from what they knew.

There is a pa.s.sage in St John's Gospel which brings this very clearly before us. The naturalness of it and its fidelity to character and situation are such, that I am as sure that these words pa.s.sed between Philip and our Lord, as if they were found in all four of the Gospels, though they only occur in the last. They occur in the final discourse of our Lord when He and the Apostles are on the way to the garden of Gethsemane. Our Lord has said,

"And whither I go, ye know the way. Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; how know we the way? Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, and the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. If ye had known me, ye would have known my Father also: from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him. Philip saith unto him, _Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us_. Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and dost thou not know me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; how sayest thou, Shew us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I say unto you I speak not from myself: but the Father abiding in me doeth his works. Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or else believe me for the very works'

sake."(45)

In Philip's words we perceive an a.s.surance of the reasonableness of what he asks, which is most true to the life. He never doubts but that G.o.d _could_ be brought before his eyes;-he supposed that the clouds might be rolled away, so as to reveal a form of awful majesty clothed with resplendent light, and with one glimpse of this he would be content. He thinks that he makes a most moderate request.

Our Lord shews a sort of surprise, that after having been so long with them, going in and out among them, they should have missed seeing that G.o.d was in Him. It was perhaps this constant companions.h.i.+p that stood in Philip's way; that what was Divine should have mingled with his daily life was beyond his conception. G.o.d, he supposed, could only shew Himself in some strange and appalling manner. That G.o.d's presence is reflected, in the least broken way, in that course of things which is most normal and most ordinary, was an idea that did not belong to Philip's race or time; but Christ drops a germ from which it should arise.

It is the concluding verse of the pa.s.sage with which I am most concerned-

"Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or _else_ believe me for the very works' sake."(46)

The first appeal is to that belief, which ought to have grown up from personal knowledge; that failing, He points to the works. This belief was of the same order as that which we have in the rect.i.tude of an honoured friend. In knowing a man, we get to a deeper kind of knowledge than we do in knowing an object: all we can tell about an object is what its properties are, we know nothing about what it _is_; but we do get nearer to knowing what a friend _is_, our souls interpenetrate, as it were, a little. So that if Philip had known our Lord as Peter did, he would, like him, have recognised the "Son of the living G.o.d." Supposing, however, that he was not sufficiently "finely touched" for such a knowledge, that he judged mainly from his senses, and needed proofs of which they could take cognisance; then-as an alternative course though a very inferior one-He might believe for the _mere Signs'_ sake. Signs were provided to suit the cases of those who could not believe without them.

But while many take it for granted that Christ rested His claims on miracles and worked His Signs to provide Himself with credentials; others have gone to the other extreme, and have urged that Christ disparaged the belief that was engendered by the sight of wonders. No doubt the principle-"Blessed are they that have not seen and yet have believed" runs through all our Lord's teaching, but it was better they should believe from the sight of _such Signs as our Lord worked_-Signs which were not coercive-than not believe at all. Signs, certainly, have led men to believe, when, either from inward or outward causes, they would not have believed without. This effect I regard as a good one, and all good that has ensued from what our Lord did, I believe that He intended to do.

The chief texts adduced in disparagement of miracles are:

"Except ye see signs and wonders, ye will in no wise believe,"(47)

and

"An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign."(48)

If signs and wonders were the appointed means of bringing men to believe, "Why," ask the objectors, "are those blamed who cannot believe without seeing them?" "Our Lord," they say, "here shews that He sets little value on the belief that comes of seeing signs." This is, no doubt, quite true of the sort of belief that comes of the mere a.s.sent of a terrified man: but our Lord did not terrify men, and the belief that sprung from seeing _His_ signs involved a will and a disposition to recognize G.o.d's hand.

I do not feel sure, however, that the first text really bears on the matter. I think it quite possible that the stress should be laid on the word _see_. The n.o.bleman "besought him that he would _come down_, and heal his son; for he was at the point of death."(49) He thought that our Lord must go down to Capernaum with him and work the cure there; he cannot believe that it will be done unless it is wrought before his eyes. When he began to speak he had not the faith of the Roman centurion; he could not suppose that the power of healing could be exercised from afar; but he soon caught this confidence from looking on our Lord. If the text have this sense it does not touch the question before us.

The second text refers to a sign from Heaven. It is spoken of those who wanted an overwhelming miracle to be wrought, which should settle the question and compel a.s.sent in the unwilling. The generation is not called "evil and adulterous" for seeking after such Signs as our Lord wrought, for crowding to see the cures for instance, but, for challenging Him to produce a Sign of a very different character, a magical one, which, for reasons explained in the last chapter, He would not do.

Our Lord Himself on several occasions points to another result of His working of Signs. It rendered the rejection of Him a sin; this was because the will was called into operation to explain these Signs away. The leaders among those adverse to Him invented loopholes, such as referring the works to Beelzebub, and those who wanted to escape being convinced availed themselves of them. In this way, the acceptance or non-acceptance of Signs formed a touchstone for discriminating those who virtually said "We will not have this man to reign over us"-a section of people to whom I alluded in the earlier part of the chapter. Men were pardoned the unbelief of blindness and dulness, but not the wilful hatred which went out of its way to find grounds for rejection, and which would refer works of pure beneficence to the chief of the devils; this shewed innate aversion. The following are pa.s.sages in point:

"Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee, Bethsaida! for if the mighty works had been done in Tyre and Sidon which were done in you, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes."(50)

"He that hateth me hateth my Father also. If I had not done among them the works which none other did, they had not had sin: but now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father."(51)

Again, it is easier to convey to another by description an external fact than a personal impression: and thus the evidence from Signs is easier to transmit from man to man than that which arises from realising a Personality. Those who followed our Lord were subjugated by His influence; some of us too may extract from His memoirs a conception of His Personality: but it is only those possessing the gift of seeing the reality in the outline, who can lay hold of this source of belief; while in a miracle, all can perceive credentials given by G.o.d.

Our Lord's course of proceeding in a very important instance, the occasion on which John the Baptist sends his disciples to Him, is a most instructive instance of His use of Signs. These Signs furnished the kind of evidence most available in that particular case.

When the Baptist is in prison he sends two of his disciples to our Lord with the question, "Art Thou He that cometh, or look we for another?"(52) Many months had pa.s.sed since the baptism of our Lord, and it seemed that nothing had been done. He was himself in prison, removed from the presence, and personal influence of our Lord. His recollections of Him were perhaps fading, and his faith growing low. He was then in the position for which the argument from signs is especially suitable-nothing would help him like facts. He was in the situation in which tens of thousands of Christians are still-believing, and yet having misgivings now and then whether what they call their Faith may not be fancy,-longing for something positive to cling to, some support outside themselves. Such support our Lord affords the Baptist; He puts him as nearly as possible in the position of a witness of the miracles.

We read:

"In that hour he cured many of diseases and plagues and evil spirits; and on many that were blind he bestowed sight. And he answered and said unto them, Go your way, and tell John what things ye have seen and heard; the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, the poor have good tidings preached to them. And blessed is he, whosoever shall find none occasion of stumbling in me."(53)